Sacre Bleu: A Comedy D’Art

**“Christopher Moore is a very sick man, in the very best sense of that word.” —Carl Hiassen** **A magnificent “Comedy d’Art” from the author of *Lamb* , *Fool* , and *Bite Me* , Moore’s *Sacré Bleu* is part mystery, part history (sort of), part love story, and wholly hilarious as it follows a young baker-painter as he joins the dapper Henri Toulouse-Lautrec on a quest to unravel the mystery behind the supposed “suicide” of Vincent van Gogh.** It is the color of the Virgin Mary’s cloak, a dazzling pigment desired by artists, an exquisite hue infused with danger, adventure, and perhaps even the supernatural. It is . . . Sacré Bleu In July 1890, Vincent van Gogh went into a cornfield and shot himself. *Or did he?* Why would an artist at the height of his creative powers attempt to take his own life . . . and then walk a mile to a doctor’s house for help? Who was the crooked little color man Vincent had claimed was stalking him across France? And why had the painter recently become deathly afraid of a certain shade of blue? These are just a few of the questions confronting Vincent’s friends—baker-turned-painter Lucien Lessard and bon vivant Henri Toulouse-Lautrec—who vow to discover the truth about van Gogh’s untimely death. Their quest will lead them on a surreal odyssey and brothel-crawl deep into the art world of late nineteenth-century Paris. *Oh là là, quelle surprise* , and *zut alors!* A delectable confection of intrigue, passion, and art history—with cancan girls, baguettes, and fine French cognac thrown in for good measure— *Sacré Bleu* is another masterpiece of wit and wonder from the one, the only, Christopher Moore.